Thanksgiving – the daily act of rendering gratitude to God, communion service; 1 Chr 16:7-36; Eph 5:20; Amo 4:4-5.

Title: Thanksgiving - the daily act of rendering gratitude to God, communion service; 1 Chr 16:7-36; EPH 5:20; AMO 4:4-5.

 

Thanksgiving is the daily act of rendering gratitude to God. And there is no gratitude to God apart from Bible doctrine in the soul.

 

Thanksgiving is motivated, therefore, by Bible doctrine resident in the soul, Colossians 2:7. You have to be taught before you overflow in thanksgiving.

 

COL 2:6-7

As you therefore have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him, having been firmly rooted and now being built up in Him and established in your faith, just as you were instructed, and overflowing with gratitude.

 

Thanksgiving is often a public acknowledgment or celebration of worship in which the goodness and graciousness of God are extolled, 1 Chronicles 16:7-36.

 

Tonight and tomorrow is one of those times where we relax in a Sabbath type of rest and reflect on all that we are grateful for.

 

1 Chron 16:7 Then on that day David first assigned Asaph [chief musician] and his relatives to give thanks to the Lord.

 

So they wrote a song that the people could sing in thanksgiving to God.

 

1 Chron 16:8 Oh give thanks to the Lord, call upon His name;

Make known His deeds among the peoples.

 

1 Chron 16:9 Sing to Him, sing praises to Him;

Speak of all His wonders.

 

1 Chron 16:10 Glory in His holy name;

Let the heart of those who seek the Lord be glad.

 

1 Chron 16:11 Seek the Lord and His strength;

Seek His face continually.

 

1 Chron 16:12 Remember His wonderful deeds which He has done,

His marvels and the judgments from His mouth,

 

1 Chron 16:13 O seed of Israel His servant,

Sons of Jacob, His chosen ones!

 

1 Chron 16:14 He is the Lord our God;

His judgments are in all the earth.

 

1 Chron 16:15 Remember His covenant forever,

The word which He commanded to a thousand generations,

 

1 Chron 16:16 The covenant which He made with Abraham,

And His oath to Isaac.

 

1 Chron 16:17 He also confirmed it to Jacob for a statute,

To Israel as an everlasting covenant,

 

1 Chron 16:18 Saying, "To you I will give the land of Canaan,

As the portion of your inheritance."

 

1 Chron 16:19 When they were only a few in number,

Very few, and strangers in it,

 

1 Chron 16:20 And they wandered about from nation to nation,

And from one kingdom to another people,

 

1 Chron 16:21 He permitted no man to oppress them,

And He reproved kings for their sakes, saying,

 

1 Chron 16:22 "Do not touch My anointed ones,

And do My prophets no harm."

 

1 Chron 16:23 Sing to the Lord, all the earth;

Proclaim good tidings of His salvation from day to day.

 

1 Chron 16:24 Tell of His glory among the nations,

His wonderful deeds among all the peoples.

 

1 Chron 16:25 For great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised;

He also is to be feared above all gods.

 

1 Chron 16:26 For all the gods of the peoples are idols,

But the Lord made the heavens.

 

1 Chron 16:27 Splendor and majesty are before Him,

Strength and joy are in His place.

 

1 Chron 16:28 Ascribe to the Lord, O families of the peoples,

Ascribe to the Lord glory and strength.

 

1 Chron 16:29 Ascribe to the Lord the glory due His name;

Bring an offering, and come before Him;

Worship the Lord in holy array.

 

1 Chron 16:30 Tremble before Him, all the earth;

Indeed, the world is firmly established, it will not be moved.

 

1 Chron 16:31 Let the heavens be glad, and let the earth rejoice;

And let them say among the nations, "The Lord reigns."

 

1 Chron 16:32 Let the sea roar, and all it contains;

Let the field exult, and all that is in it.

 

1 Chron 16:33 Then the trees of the forest will sing for joy before the Lord;

For He is coming to judge the earth.

 

1 Chron 16:34 O give thanks to the Lord, for He is good;

For His lovingkindness is everlasting.

 

1 Chron 16:35 Then say, "Save us, O God of our salvation,

And gather us and deliver us from the nations,

To give thanks to Thy holy name,

And glory in Thy praise."

 

1 Chron 16:36 Blessed be the Lord, the God of Israel,

From everlasting even to everlasting.

Then all the people said, "Amen," and praised the Lord.

 

The only people who are thankful are those who know God, Psalm 100:3-5.

 

Ps 100:1 Shout joyfully to the Lord, all the earth.

 

Ps 100:2 Serve the Lord with gladness;

Come before Him with joyful singing.

 

Ps 100:3 Know that the Lord Himself is God;

It is He who has made us, and not we ourselves;

We are His people and the sheep of His pasture [He provides the pasture and the Shepherd].

 

Ps 100:4 Enter His gates with thanksgiving,

And His courts with praise. Give thanks to Him; bless His name [titlepersonessence].

 

Enter the local assembly with gratitude for the Bible doctrine that is taught.

 

Ps 100:5 For the Lord is good;

His lovingkindness is everlasting [strength, steadfastness, and love],

And His faithfulness to all generations.

 

Thanksgiving is the service and sacrifice of a priest and every CA believer is a royal priest, PSA 107:22; 116:17; Amos 4:5; HEB 13:15.

 

Ps 107:21 Let them give thanks to the Lord for His lovingkindness,

And for His wonders to the sons of men!

 

Ps 107:22 Let them also offer sacrifices of thanksgiving,

And tell of His works with joyful singing.

 

Ps 116:16 O Lord, surely I am Thy servant,

I am Thy servant, the son of Thy handmaid,

Thou hast loosed my bonds.

 

 

Ps 116:17 To Thee I shall offer a sacrifice of thanksgiving,

And call upon the name of the Lord.

 

To thank Him for what He truly is and what He has truly done is to simultaneously admit that I am nothing. I am only a vessel of grace that can only receive from Him. What could I ever do to earn or deserve anything from the perfect, infinite, and glorious Almighty?

 

God never much cared for the sacrifices of bulls and goats, but was looking for their meaning in the hearts of men - grace redemption.

 

Be careful to know that thankfulness is not just an overt showing of singing or giving or even saying it, for though man will fall for these facades of thanks, God looks upon the heart.

 

The sacrifice of thanksgiving comes from the heart of the believer who understands in humility that he is the recipient of grace. It is not an overt show of thanks with no reality.

 

Amos 4:4 "Enter Bethel and transgress;

In Gilgal multiply transgression!

Bring your sacrifices every morning,

Your tithes every three days.

 

Bethel was a very special place to the Jewish people because of its associations with Abraham and Jacob. At one time, the ark was kept at Bethel, but in Amos' day it was the site of "the king's chapel" where Amaziah, the priest, served. Gilgal was also important to Israel because that's where Joshua and the people camped when they first entered the Promised Land. Gilgal is also where Saul was made king of Israel. Unfortunately, both of these places had become shrines, where the people worshiped pagan gods while claiming to worship the Lord.

 

Amos 4:5 "Offer a thank offering also from that which is leavened [violation of the Law - laziness of thinking, unconcerned with the protocol of God’s word],

And proclaim freewill offerings, make them known.

For so you love to do, you sons of Israel,"

Declares the Lord God.

 

They were much like the Corinthians. [keep your place in Amos]

 

1 Cor 11:17 But in giving this instruction, I do not praise you, because you come together not for the better but for the worse.

 

1 Cor 11:18 For, in the first place, when you come together as a church, I hear that divisions exist among you; and in part, I believe it.

 

1 Cor 11:19 For there must also be factions among you, in order that those who are approved may have become evident among you.

 

1 Cor 11:20 Therefore when you meet together, it is not to eat the Lord's Supper,

 

1 Cor 11:21 for in your eating each one takes his own supper first; and one is hungry and another is drunk.

 

1 Cor 11:22 What! Do you not have houses in which to eat and drink? Or do you despise the church of God, and shame those who have nothing? What shall I say to you? Shall I praise you? In this I will not praise you.

 

The application to today's church is obvious. It's very easy for us to join a large, happy religious crowd, enthusiastically sing rousing songs, and put money in the offering plate, and yet not be changed in our hearts. The test of a spiritual experience is not "Do I feel good?" or "Did we have a big crowd and a good time?" The real test is "Do I know God better and am I more like Jesus Christ?"

 

Amos 5:21 "I hate, I reject your festivals,

Nor do I delight in your solemn assemblies.

 

Amos 5:22 "Even though you offer up to Me burnt offerings and your grain offerings,

I will not accept them;

And I will not even look at the peace offerings of your fatlings.

 

Amos 5:23 "Take away from Me the noise of your songs;

I will not even listen to the sound of your harps.

 

Amos 5:24 "But let justice roll down like waters

And righteousness like an ever-flowing stream.

 

Do we not celebrate a sacrifice in the Lord’s supper, and are we not commanded to remember Him during this time in thankfulness for all He has done for us? When we sing it must be from a glad heart or else it just noise, no matter how good or bad your voice may be. When you eat and drink the elements without the reality of what they represent you devour that which is holy in meaning.

 

HEB 13:14 For here we do not have a lasting city, but we are seeking the city which is to come.

 

HEB 13:15 Through Him then, let us continually offer up a sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of lips that give thanks to His name.

 

HEB 13:16 And do not neglect doing good and sharing; for with such sacrifices God is pleased.

 

Graciousness and thankfulness to God go hand in hand.

 

Thanksgiving and gratitude is the normal mental attitude of the royal family of God, meaning that if you aren’t grateful daily then you’re abnormal, Ephesians 5:20; 1 Thessalonians 5:18.

 

EPH 5:15 Therefore be careful how you walk, not as unwise men, but as wise,

 

EPH 5:16 making the most of your time, because the days are evil.

 

EPH 5:17 So then do not be foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is [divinely inspired word].

 

EPH 5:18 And do not get drunk with wine, for that is dissipation [waste of time], but be filled with the Spirit [thinking divine viewpoint],

 

1 Cor 2:12

Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might know the things freely given to us by God,

 

Drunkenness is contrasted with the filling of the Spirit because a drunken person cannot think straight or clearly and is extremely fleshly. The Spirit, which leads us to think with the deep things of God, discerning the natural and the spiritual and putting these things in their proper place in our scale of values, would be the direct opposite of drunkenness.

 

EPH 5:19 speaking to one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody with your heart to the Lord;

 

This does not mean that we sing to each other. Psalms and hymns and spiritual songs contain words of adoration of God and praise of Him, therefore in our speaking to one another it should always be the adoration of the Trinity and gratitude of the work of the Son and the Father and the revealing of the HS that should be our motivation and reference when we speak to one another. Not to say that we just speak verses to each other, but He is always in our minds and because of that we guard our tongues from sin and rejoice in the finished work, our victory, our thankfulness, all powered by God’s Spirit within us.

 

[What is the normal conversation or banter at thanksgiving? Trampled pearls.]

 

EPH 5:20 always giving thanks for all things in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ to God, even the Father;

 

This doesn’t mean to say “in Jesus’ name” all the time.

 

 “in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ” = occupation with Christ through personal love for Christ.

 

It is because of His personname that I can see anything that I would be grateful for, despite the hatred and evil in the world, even if I were to be martyred or a loved one martyred, as a believer I know my Lord has conquered death, oh death where is your victory, oh death where is your sting? Love for Him comes through knowledge of Him and that only through Bible doctrine, the divinely inspired word of God.

 

 “giving thanks” - euvcariste,w [eucharisteo] = the expression of joy towards God, giving thanks to God on the basis of received benefit.

 

This word demonstrates the principle of love. When you truly love someone you are thankful for that person. You give thanks for that person, you are occupied with that person. That person is in your soul, in your right lobe, in your frame of reference, in your memory centre, and you are constantly thinking about that person.

 

Not gushy personal love that is weak and fleeting, but true soul attachment, divine, virtuous, love in which your integrity and the integrity of another match to become one. Are you not in Christ and He in you?

 

Giving thanks is a mental attitude, it is a mental attitude of thinking of someone else.

 

 True thankfulness is a mental attitude of love and therefore a mental attitude of appreciation.

 

It is a very strong word for a mental attitude of having a scale of values and of relating that scale of values to a total appreciation for the source.

 

If you are growing in grace it is inevitable that you will have a mental attitude divine viewpoint and therefore a mental attitude of thanksgiving toward God.

 

It is a wonderful thing for members of the royal family of God to be grateful to God in time for all that He has provided, whether it is blessing or adversity, regardless of the circumstances.

 

Therefore it is a wonderful privilege of the royal priest to on a daily basis express in his thinking and in his prayer, in his attitude of love, in his occupation with the person of Christ, this is thanksgiving.

 

And where there is growth in grace, and where the believer has the capacity to love Jesus Christ, and where the believer is occupied with Christ, the communion table then becomes a very meaningful and wonderful thing.

 

1 Cor 11:23 For I received from the Lord that which I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus in the night in which He was betrayed took bread;

 

1 Cor 11:24 and when He had given thanks [eucharisteo], He broke it, and said, "This is My body, which is for you; do this in remembrance of Me." 

 

1 Cor 11:25 In the same way He took the cup also, after supper, saying, "This cup is the new covenant in My blood; do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of Me." 

 

1 Cor 11:26 For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until He comes.

 

Doctrine can be the source of the most wonderful blessings in life and it can also be the source of the greatest misery in life if the believer becomes negative towards it. The Word and the Person are one and the same.

 

1 Thess 5:18

in everything give thanks; for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus.

 

After the Lord’s supper in the upper room they sang a hymn.